


Where The Eagles Dare

by spacelorde



Category: Greek and Roman Mythology
Genre: Angst, Canon Era, Disabled Character, Fluff, M/M, Prometheus is soft gay boi, Zeus is the asshole we all know him to be
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-01
Updated: 2018-07-01
Packaged: 2019-05-31 12:34:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,123
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15119510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacelorde/pseuds/spacelorde
Summary: Star-crossed lovers divided by the inevitability of the future and the stubborn path of destiny.Even in darkness love survives.





	Where The Eagles Dare

A mortal and a titan sit side by side on the head of a great boulder, gazing at the stars. The mortal, barely a man and the titan barely a god.  
They are spending the last few quiet moments together before the titan, Prometheus, must answer his cousin Zeus’ summons to Olympus.  
“It is almost time, my love,” Prometheus says.  
“Can Zeus not wait a few more cherished seconds?”  
“It is best not to leave the King of the Gods waiting. I may be a titan, but I am no fool.”  
“No, you’re right, to be a fool is Pandora’s job,” says his lover, Nikias a young man of 19 winters with dark, curly hair and amber eyes.  
Not wanting to risk Zeus’ patience any longer, Prometheus turns to his mortal lover and gives him a peck on the cheek before disappearing into the brisk, night air.

Prometheus seldom found himself summoned to Olympus, let alone to Zeus’ throne room. He had been less than surprised when he received it two moons ago. Prometheus knew there could only be one reason for his summons. Five moons ago at the meeting in Mecone, Prometheus had tricked Zeus into choosing bones and fat as the appropriate sacrifice to the gods.  
_In front of mortal peasants, no less _, Prometheus thinks as he enters the marble halls of Olympus.__  
His rare presence spurs whispers, and intrusive glances follow him through the torch lit halls of Olympus. He turns the corner towards Zeus’ throne room and finds himself face to face with Hephaestus, the god of fire.  
“It has been much too long, my friend,” Hephaestus says as he envelopes Prometheus in a hug. “What brings you to our halls? Have you finally grown tired with the mortals and their mundane trifles?”  
The titan and the god separate but remain within arm’s length of each other.  
“Has taking hammer to metal every night for the past millennia given you cause to consider taking up a new profession?”  
Hephaestus laughs heartily, as the light from the torches dances across his face and the halls’ marble walls.  
“Indeed, a fair point,” Hephaestus says. “However, even I must take a break on occasion! Euclei has finally convinced me to see her for more than just an afternoon.”  
“Ah, her nagging and bribery have finally paid-off!”  
“Yes, and quite effectively as well! I will be absent my workshop for three moons!”  
“Three moons?” Prometheus jokes. “Are you really capable of being away from your furnace for so long? Won’t your workshop grow lonely in your absence? I fear your hammer and anvil will become envious of Euclei…”  
“If not for my sister, Athena, I would fear so but she has requested to spend some time tinkering in my workshop during my absence. Only until dusk every evening I believe she said…I envy her self-control.”  
Prometheus claps Hephaestus on the shoulder.  
“You envy the wrong quality of her, old friend,” Prometheus half-jokes, shaking his head. “But even if you were half as beautiful as Athena you would still be twice as ugly. As much as I have enjoyed our breaking of words, I must get going.”  
Hephaestus reaches out to grab the titans arm as Prometheus attempts to leave.  
“You have still not answered my question as to why you are here, but if I were to hazard a guess I would say it must have something to do with the incident in Mecone,” Hephaestus says lowly as his face darkens. “While I understand your love for Nikias, you must refrain from crossing my father. His temper is not to be taken lightly.”  
Prometheus looks up at the ceiling for a moment and studies the false history painted there.  
“Mecone was a necessary evil,” Prometheus says, turning his gaze back to Hephaestus. “Not just for Nikias but for all of mankind, and as for your father…I have known him longer than you have drawn breath.”  
With that, Prometheus removes the gods’ hand from his arm and continues on his way.

____

Prometheus stands before the ornate doors to Zeus’ throne room. He regards the doors for a moment, taking in the mural that adorns the white marble doors. Zeus took great artistic liberties with the mural for he was depicted alone standing victorious over his father, Kronos, as the titan fell into the pits of Tartarus.  
_If only the gods had coin for Zeus to deface _, Prometheus snorts. Perhaps that would satiate his egotism.__  
He knocks twice and the doors creak open, revealing an ornate throne room embedded with gold. At the very end of the room rests a black marble throne gleaming with gold veins upon which a great ruby-eyed eagle perches above the King of the Gods, who is stuffing his face with ox thigh and holding a goblet of wine.  
_Zeus may as well be the god of extravagance and gluttony _, Prometheus thinks as he walks towards Zeus’ throne. He stops a few feet in front of it.__  
“I am sure you know why I have summoned you here,” Zeus says with his mouth full.  
A beat of silence echoes through the throne room as Zeus takes a long gulp of wine.  
“The events at Mecone and your role in them, has forced my hand,” Zeus says. “I have to admit what you did was very clever. While I expected some trickery, I never thought you’d go so far as to hide meat inside the belly of an ox.”  
Zeus takes another swig of wine.  
“That is why it has taken me sometime to come to what I believe is a fair punishment,” Zeus says, pausing to drink from his goblet again. “For your trickery, I have decided that from today forth humankind shall no longer know the benefits of fire. Not for warmth. Not for smithing. Not for eating.”  
“Mortals need meat to survive, Cousin,” Prometheus says.  
“Then they shall eat it raw.”  
Zeus’ fingers snap, and his face spreads into a cruel grin.

_____ _

At that moment in the mortal world, Nikias lay on the boulder staring at the stars. On the lake shore below, some villagers sit around fires wrapping themselves in furs to stem the biting chill in the air.  
In a clap of thunder and a flash of lighting, the fires disappear. All the warmth leaves the mortal world and a bone-deep cold replaces it.  
Nikias startles and sits up. Light snow begins to fall.  
He climbs down from the boulder and walks to the nearest befuddled group of villagers.  
The moon still hangs high in the night sky, yet he feels as if everything has changed.

Back in Olympus, Zeus sits smugly upon his throne. No more words cast themselves between Prometheus and the Olympian anymore. Prometheus instead grits his teeth, sets his jaw, and turns on his heel to leave the throne room.  
Prometheus had seen the struggle of man. He knew that food was scarce during the cold months of winter. That there were many a time where his creations went hungry. Sometimes Nikias would tell him stories of the harshest winters he had survived but that others hadn’t.  
But he also knew Zeus.  
Zeus, who still held a grudge towards titans and all that they had created, including man. Zeus would love nothing more than to watch men die.  
_Zeus be damned _, Prometheus thinks. If Nikias or any mortal born into the hands of Gaea were to grow old, they needed the warmth of fire. This will not be the end of the human race.__

____

Prometheus returns to Nikias that evening with a furrowed brow, though the mortal is not where Prometheus left him.  
No, the familiar boulder where he so often met Nikias jutted out from the snow defiantly but void of the mortals’ familiar body. On the shores of the lake below, he sees the remnants of the camp fires snuffed out by Zeus. A sense of worry washes over Prometheus and he sets out to the only other place he believes Nikias to be.  
He finds the mortal wrapped in furs, shivering in his humble mud brick home on the outskirts of the forest. Nikias catches sight of Prometheus and smiles in relief. Prometheus rushes to his side and pulls the man into a tight embrace.  
“It seems I have my own furnace,” says Nikias. “And a titan no less!”  
Prometheus smiles and closes his eyes. With a deep breath, he clears his mind. _If only I could be a furnace for all men _, he thinks. _One that could burn as long and as brightly as the midday sun, then maybe the weight of the future would not feel so crushing in its invetiability _.___  
That night he lies awake in bed with Nikias in his arms. His soul would not find rest until he could scheme his way to the reinstatement of fire for mankind. Stealing from a god was not an action to consider lightly and betraying Zeus the King of the Gods would carry an even greater consequence. For mankind and for his love, he would do anything.  
_But am I willing to do so no matter the cost? _He asks himself. _Defiance does not come without a price. ______

_____ _

The next morning, they lay side-by-side upon furs in a damp field of fading everlastings. The shining sun melts away the evening snow, and Prometheus finds himself thanking Apollo for small blessings.  
Nikias turns on his side and caresses the titan’s worried brow.  
“What is it that troubles this handsome face, my love,” Nikias says.  
“The future.”  
“I cannot think of a time when it didn’t, but this future that furrows your brow and makes you silent is more than the worry of an old man.”  
To this Prometheus smiles.  
“There is something I must do,” said Prometheus. He turns to his side as well and picks an everlasting, rolling it between his fingers staining them yellow. “The action holds great risk, but inaction alone holds greater consequence.”  
Nikias kisses his titan on the forehead.  
“Then do what you must as you always have.”  
“No matter the risk?”  
Nikias sits up.  
“Prometheus, I will die one day, and you will live on for many more lifetimes after. If the risk is that I may never see you again I think my heart will shatter but I will live on and so will the rest of mankind. I would rather suffer for the greater good than have my fellow man die of my selfishness.”  
“Then, there is something I must ask of you.”  
“What is it you need?”

In the fading hours of dusk, Prometheus sneaks back into Olympus. His footsteps echoing through its marble halls until he comes to the workshop of Hephaestus. The door swings open and the absence of Athena’s figure blesses the titans’ vision.  
On the far wall of Hephaestus’ workshop a great furnace protrudes. Its fires crackling and spitting eternally. The furnace burns so hot that the heat of its flames would have instantly consumed any mortal or lesser god. From his robes he pulls a stalk of fennel and carefully traps some fire from Hephaestus’ furnace inside.  
He leaves the way he came just before the break of dawn. His footsteps echoing one last time in the halls he wished he had found a home in.

 

Fennel in hand, Prometheus’ heart seizes at the state of man. Fall had faded into winter. Snow blanketed the earth and there were no fires to keep mankind warm from its chill. He had never seen the mortal world so dark and cold since their creation. With great trepidation he descends to the earth. His feet land firmly upon the smooth stone of the boulder he and his love frequented. Nikias sits shivering upon it and startles at Prometheus’ abrupt appearance before turning to embrace him with a fierce kiss. Prometheus pays care to hold the fire away.  
When their lips part Prometheus hands Nikias the fennel torch, their hands lingering where they meet.  
“Here is my last gift to man,” Prometheus says. “Take it and let your kin be pulled from darkness once more.”  
“If I never see you again in my mortal life I want you to know that I would have spent my days no other way than in your embrace,” Nakias says with a quivering voice as tears well up in his eyes. “Neither god, nor death could remove me if they tried.”  
“If I never see you again in your mortal life I want you to know that there has been no greater blessing in all my millennia than loving you,” said Prometheus.  
With one last kiss the two parted ways. The mortal running to deliver the fire back to mankind.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi y'all I wrote this for my Engl 3140 class and I hope y'all liked it! Our assignment was to take a myth and keep the setting and the main plot points but make it our own. Took me forever to finish the final draft for the portfolio...still got that A tho. heheheheh :))))))))))
> 
>  
> 
> Also sorry for poor formatting was too lazy for that shit.


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